Sabre and Amadeus seek joint venture approval

Sabre Holdings and Amadeus have filed with the European Commission for
antitrust approval to create a joint venture concentrating on non-air
items.

The rival Global Distribution System companies said the initiative
would provide "secure, automated payment processing, clearing and
reconciliation solutions" to the global travel industry.

"The intent of the joint venture is to establish an industry standard
solution to improve and better meet the requirements of the travel
industry with payment efficiencies, increased automation, and improved
interoperability," a statement said.

"The joint venture plans to focus on the non-air segments of the
industry such as hotels, cruise, tour, car and rail.

"The joint venture will integrate the existing financial instruments
already used by the travel industry into a best-in-class
multi-channel, multi-GDS platform, which will allow travel industry
players to effectively manage all aspects of their payment needs in a
flexible, easy-to-use solution."

No further details were given, with both companies saying more
information on the joint venture solution will be available upon
approval, but no timetable was indicated.

The move comes as competitor GDSs Galileo and Worldspan conclude
merger arrangements.

Categories: Travel Technology, Travel Agent, Hotel & Resort, Tour
Operator, Airline, Business Travel
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hmm... Kailua Kona, HI, United States Vacation Rentals

Hale O Pua Lani
	Apartment 2 bedrooms, sleeps 5 1 bathrooms Beach, Ocean Pool, Dishwasher, Satellite / Cable TV	Rates (shown in USD): $99 - $150 Per Night
	Email Owner    View Availability    Add to Favorites

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A Blog Alert for the term: "popular destination" I find interesting

Kill Devil Hills vacation rental
By Daniel B.
Kill Devils Hills, a popular destination for vacation on the Outer banks has many rental homes, hotels around. However, I prefer Kill Devil Hills vacation rental to expensive hotels. These vacation villas are located near the hot spots ...
Blognitive Dissonance - http://blogdiss.weblogs.u

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Aviary’s Incredibly Ambitious Art Project

The guys behind Worth1000 and Plime have been tooling away at a new venture called Aviary (although it's confusingly hosted at CreationOnTheFly.com ). With Aviary, the New York based team is aiming at the rather ambitious goal of not only creating a marketplace for multimedia artwork, but a suite of robust collaborative online applications with which to create the works.

The obvious question is "why both tools and a marketplace?" As founder Avi Muchnick believes, both are needed for the other to be successful. They need a marketplace for creators to sell their works and encourage use of the tools. They need tools so they can confirm and maintain the copyright of the works created on the platform.

The lingering question is whether online tools will be of a high enough caliber to produce marketable content. So far, signs are pointing to yes.

When completed, Aviary will consist of 14 online tools of varying complexity: an image editor, color swatch generator, pattern generator, vector-based editor, 3D modeler, audio editor, music generator, video editor, desktop publishing tool, word processor, painting simulator, custom image product creator, photo analyzer, and file system to store it all on. Each of the applications is programmed in Flex, making them ready to meld with your desktop upon Adobe AIR's public release. Adding an artsy twist, each tool will be named after a different bird.

All items created in these programs will be stored on their own file system called Rookry. From there, artists will be able to sell their creations on the open market. Even small pieces, such as patterns or sound effects will be marketable. If the works are made within Aviary, buyers will have the security of knowing they are buying an original work. If they incorporate outside content, they will be flagged as such. From within Aviary's platform artists will also be able also create derivative works while maintaining attribution and royalty rights upon sale.

The team will be releasing the tools as they're completed. They're already showing some pretty serious results with their image editor (Phoenix), Vector Editor (Raven), and 3D editor (Hummingbird) outlined below:

Phoenix

Phoenix is like Photoshop without trying to replace it. You get a lot of the familiar features such as brushes, patterns, stamps, smudging, shapes, blending options, and more.

The Aviary team decided on a core feature set by polling their band of PhotoShop fanatics using Worth1000 to find Photoshop's most frequently used features. The editor can work on an image of max dimensions of 2880 by 2880 pixels.

The editor does support importing and exporting images of familiar formats, but any Aviary work that includes an imported image not created in the suite will be marked as such in the marketplace. This will help alert buyers to the possibility that the creator doesn't have full copyright over the work.

Raven

Raven is their vector based drawing program. It's based on a lot of the design from Phoenix, but allows artists the flexibility of vector based drawing (e.g. easy scaling/rotation without losing quality). Raven will connect with Phoenix, allowing illustrations created in Raven to be rasterized and edited in Phoenix.

Click on the image to the right for a larger view.

Hummingbird

Hummingbird is their 3D editor designed completely in Flex. Right now they've just got a 3D model renderer along with some basic editing tools (element selection/deletion), but are working on a more robust UI for creating new models from scratch.

The hummingbird on the right was rendered with the engine in real time with a metallic gold skin.

Click on the image for a real time demo of the 3D rendering engine.
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Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode - New Solo Album Press Release

Punk.bz - USA

Dave Gahan Releases His Eagerly Anticipated 2nd Solo LP

‘Hourglass’ in October

Depeche Mode frontman Dave Gahan will release his second solo album Hourglass in October in Canada on Mute Records/EMI Music Canada. This release is the follow-up to his 2003 solo album Paper Monsters which marked his debut as a full-fledged songwriter. The LP earned critical acclaim worldwide - with Q Magazine citing it as one of the Top 50 Albums of the Year - and spawned sold-out solo tours of the U.S. and Europe as captured on the 2004 live DVD release Live Monsters.

Gahan’s growth as a songwriter was represented on Depeche Mode’s 2005 album Playing The Angel, the group’s first album to feature Gahan originals; his three contributions included the single ‘Suffer Well.’ A two million worldwide seller that vaulted to Number 1 in eighteen countries, the album was accompanied by a 2005-2006 international tour reaching 2.5 million people across 30 countries.

While Depeche Mode are catching their breath, Gahan recently returned to the studio to record an array of songs that would become the eagerly anticipated Hourglass. Created without the pressure of a deadline, Gahan wrote and produced all the songs in collaboration with Christian Eigner (drums) and Andrew Phillpott (guitars) of the Depeche Mode touring band. They worked at Gahan’s 11th Floor Studios in his adopted hometown of NYC where he’s lived for the past 10 years. Tony Hoffer, known for his work with Beck, Air, the Kooks and the Fratellis, has been tapped to mix the album this month.

Gahan says Hourglass is more electronic-sounding than his solo debut Paper Monsters, “but we were very aware of the importance of keeping urgency in the sound and a feeling of spontaneity. We didn’t want to get bogged down in trying to make everything sound perfect. You want to keep the rough edges.”

Gahan adds: “Christian plays drums and Andrew can easily find his way around bass and guitar–and then we’re basically cutting all this stuff up and fucking with it by using ProTools, effects and all kinds of stuff. Accidents do happen, and they’re good.” The album’s tracks include ‘Saw Something,’ ‘Use You,’ ‘Endless,’ ‘21 Days,’ ‘A Little Lie,’ ‘Deeper and Deeper,’ ‘Love Will Leave,’ ‘Down,’ ‘Miracle,‘ ‘Tomorrow’ and ‘Kingdom.’

With its themes of racing against–and running out of–time, the songs on Hourglass dig deeper into Gahan’s psyche. “I’m still that teenager who’s desperately trying to grow up, but in total fear of it really happening,” he says.

www.davegahan.com

See all stories on this topic

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Real Ale Trail to pull visitors

Thirsty visitors will soon be able to sample some of Scotland's most popular pints on the country's first ever Real Ale Trail.  Over 50 Scottish breweries will be coming together to ensure visitors get to sample the quality and diversity of Scottish beer and ales.

Visitors on the trail will get the opportunity to tour some of Scotland's  world famous breweries to learn more about Scottish real ales and of course sample the tasty tipple.

A Real Ale Trail website is also being set up with the VisitScotland funding.  Yvonne Cook who heads VisitScotland's Challenge Fund which is funding the Trail said: "The Real Ale Trail is a superb example of the kind of partnership initiative we need to encourage to achieve our objective of a 50% growth in tourism revenues by 2015. "By linking up with hotels, attractions, bars and restaurants as well as breweries, the Real Ale Trail becomes something that benefits the wider industry—tourism really is everyone's business."

The trail will potentially take visitors to up to fifty breweries around Scotland, from Orkney to the Borders. It will be up and running later this year.

Jam! Showbiz - Canada

Feist, Fire get Polaris noms
-Julie Doiron: "Woke Myself Up" (Endearing Records/Fontana North/Universal Music Canada)

-Feist: "The Reminder (Arts & Crafts/EMI Music Canada). ...
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retransmitted by http://evrewhere.com/andrewnewton/